The Hotel
by kaelma
Summary: This is an entry for the "Let's Write Sherlock" challenge 3 on tumblr. The challenge is to write a fanfic, based on/inspired by a piece of music. I chose the song "Hotel California" by the Eagles for my inspiration, and wrote a story about John and Sherlock finding a strange hotel on a dark desert highway.


Mrs. Hudson has an old friend who moved to America some years ago, but they've kept in touch. When her friend had some trouble with what her friend called "heartless identity theft blackmail," Mrs. Hudson was quick to suggest Sherlock do something about it. The fact that he'd been sulking and his usual unbearable self that comes from inactivity may have had something to do with the suggestion as well.

Sherlock was dismissive, but desperate. So we took a flight out to California. Sherlock, and Mrs. H, insisted I go along, though I think for very different reasons. I didn't have an excuse not to.

The case was not exactly the urgent matter it was made out to be. Sherlock grumbled constantly about the waste of time, but managed to be slightly civil for Mrs. Hudson's sake. I'm not going to bother saying anything else about the case. What I want - need - to write about is what happened afterward.

Mrs. H's friend lives in a small town, a long drive from any major cities. Of course we'd rented a car, as Americans don't put proper value on mass public transport. And of course I had to drive on the wrong side of the road, and listen to Sherlock's snark, at night. It should come as no surprise that we found ourselves driving down a dark desert highway, completely lost.

I rolled the windows down to feel the cool breeze, and I was certain I could smell marijuana mixed in with the aroma of desert flowers. Sherlock was no help, there wasn't a landmark in sight, and the instant I saw a light in the distance I turned down a side road and pulled up to an old hotel.

"Right. I'm tired, Sherlock, so either we go in and get a room for the night, or you can drive."

He sighed, "We may as well go in, at the very least to get some directions, since you're obviously lost."

"I'm sorry, I didn't hear you giving any suggestions back there."

"Of course not, what do I know about the rural roads of the American West? Worse than the solar system."

I honestly couldn't tell if that had been a self-referential joke or not. It didn't matter, because a woman was standing in the hotel entrance. A church bell rang in the distance. The whole picture was instantly disturbing. She was not classically pretty, more hauntingly lovely. She was dressed in fine clothes, with diamonds wrapped around her neck like Audrey Hepburn in that movie. She held a small lit candelabra, but something about the atmosphere; the setting sun, the church bell's toll, this sudden and strange appearance of this woman... we could easily be in for a night of heaven, or a night of hell.

"Gentlemen," she said, her voice like silk, "please come in. We have plenty of room."

Sherlock and I glanced at each other. We were both hesitant, but there was no reason to be. So we went in.

Voices filled the corridors.

"Sounds like quite the gathering," I tried to make small talk.

Our hostess nodded, "Yes. I'm sure everyone will welcome you. This is such a lovely old place, and we're open all year. Most of our guests are regulars."

"Mostly men," Sherlock stated.

She shrugged. "Friends." We were led down winding halls and past an inner courtyard where a large group of attractive young men and some attractive young women were all dancing to strange, rhythmic, ethereal music. Everyone was worked into a sweat.

"The dancing. Why?" Sherlock asked.

Our hostess smiled. "To remember better days. Or forget the bad ones. Depends on the person, I suppose."

Sherlock nodded, frowning. This place wasn't sitting right with me, but Sherlock was clearly seeing something I wasn't. As usual. "Do you own the hotel?" I asked.

The question surprised her. "Oh no. I merely welcome guests, and do whatever tasks the master - Mister C, the owner, asks me to. One bed or two?"

I rolled my eyes. "Two."

"You two can stay here tonight." She opened a door, revealing a small but lavishly decorated bedroom with two beds. "Have a pleasant evening. Do come down to join in the fun."

She left. I turned to Sherlock, "All right, what is it?"

"When you asked if she was the owner, what did you see?"

"She was surprised."

"More than surprised. She hid it well, but merely mentioning Mister C, or the Master, as perhaps he is actually referred to by his staff and guests, sent her into a state of terror."

"Granted, this is a weird place, but -"

"More than weird, John. I will stake my life on the fact that those people in the courtyard are drugged. The hostess is materialistic to the point of it being an addiction. The items she wore were of the highest quality, and she continuously petted them, not as if she worried they would be stolen, but as an emotional or psychological reassurance. The hotel itself is old, yet shows no sign of disrepair. A masterful craftsman at work maintaining it, no doubt."

I nodded. "So why do I feel like we're being watched?"

We looked at each other a moment, then glanced around the room. Sherlock examined every inch of every floorboard and wall panelling, but came up with nothing. "I agree, John, there is an atmosphere to this hotel that is unsettling, and there is no rational reason for it, apart from the odd hostess and the drunken drugged party in the courtyard. And the mirrors on the ceiling."

I glanced up. There were mirrors on the ceiling.

"Well that's strange. Still, hardly menacing. Just a holdover from the eighties."

Sherlock nodded. "Precisely."

"You're going to prowl around the hotel anyway."

"Yes."

"Right then. I am going to try to get some sleep so we can leave as early as possible."

I couldn't sleep. I kept hearing voices singing from the courtyard, though I couldn't make out the words. In desperation, I called down to the man at the front desk and asked for a drink. Preferably alcoholic.

I was told they hadn't had that sort of spirit here since 1969.

"You're kidding. Ah, well... wait, what sort of spirits do you have?"

But he'd hung up.

Thoroughly confused, I sat there a moment, leaping out of the bed when someone knocked on the door.

The hostess came in, carrying an ice bucket with a bottle of pink champagne lodged in it.

"The front desk just said you didn't have alcohol."

She laughed. It was a bubbly sound, and entirely unnatural. "Don't mind the old Captain. We try to reserve it for special occasions, but I always welcome guests with a bottle."

"Oh. Well, that's... nice. And unusual."

"It is an unusual hotel," she smiled, and poured us each a glass. "Where's your friend?"

"Ah, out. Looking around, I think he may have been heading back down to the courtyard."

"I see. Cheers."

She sat close to me. I could make out voices in the hall and drifting through the window, singing a welcome. "Quite the party."

"I told you you'd be welcomed. We're all prisoners here."

I looked at her, hard. "What?"

"Of our own device, of course," she grinned with another artificial laugh. Her eyes were anything but humorous. They widened in a moment of panicked mania, "You have to help us," she said, before covering her plea with another laugh, "there's no way we'll be able to finish off the feast without help."

"I... ah, no. No, I think the best thing for me would be to wait for my friend to get back." She was disappointed. And sad. "If he doesn't come back soon, I'll come to the... feast."

That didn't do much to comfort her either, but she put on a smile and said, "Good. I'll see you there." And she left.

What the hell was that? Clearly she was in danger, or thought she was, and thought someone was watching her. Oh god. Where was Sherlock?

If there was a chance that the people here, and us, were in danger, I needed to find him. I ran out of the room, randomly choosing a direction. I was promptly lost.

It was impossible. There was no way the hotel could be so big. It hadn't looked that big from the outside, it didn't look this big when we were shown our rooms. I couldn't even find the courtyard, just corridor after corridor of earthen walls and dim lights, a sickeningly sweet smell permeating everything, intoxicating, gagging me.

I heard voices again, singing. I started to follow them, figuring I could at least find someone to tell me how to get back to my room. The singing shifted as I got closer. It wasn't singing; it was chanting. A slow, hypnotic chant, pulling me closer to the dark door, my own heartbeat ringing in my ears. Something grabbed me from behind, pulling me away as I struggled to get inside, slowly dragging my unwilling body down the hall and around a corner.

"John! Snap out of it!"

I blinked, looking up at Sherlock. "What? Oh. What are you - how did -"

"We're leaving. Now."

"No, wait, we can't, I think these people are in trouble."

"Oh yes. That is why we're leaving."

"What?" I ran after him, "If they're really in trouble, then we have to help them!"

"There is no helping them."

"Damn it, Sherlock, stop a moment and tell me what's wrong!" He spun around to face me and I immediately stepped back. I have never seen Sherlock Holmes as he looked just then. Even the Baskerville case, which shook him to the core, was nothing compared to the pure, absolute horror I saw in his eyes that night.

"It's a cult, John. That's the only explanation for it, the only possible logical reason."

I took a breath, focusing on what was important. "Sherlock, that woman, the one who showed us around, she was terrified. She asked for help."

"We. Can't. Help," he growled, starting to walk again, "You didn't see it, John."

"See what?"

His voice was deadpan, the slightest tremble revealing the emotion he struggled to keep buried. "I wandered until I came across that door, the one you were about to enter. I managed to get in, unnoticed by the people inside. There was a feast, of sorts. A table laid out in the chamber. Everyone we had seen from the courtyard gathered in front of it, around some sort of animal. Creature. They stabbed it, over and over and over and - it was still alive as I escaped. Something followed me, but I managed to lose it in these labyrinthine halls. The chanting's hypnotic quality drew me back, breaking when I saw you about to enter."

If I hadn't seen the look on his face, I wouldn't have believed him. "Ok. Well, then, we have to shut this place down."

"Shh. It's close."

"What is?"

"Whatever followed me earlier."

"How do you know?"

"I can smell it."

The lights dimmed. The sickly sweet smell was back. If this was what Sherlock had smelled, then that meant it had been following me, too. Following. Or hunting?

We ran.

We ran through the halls, trusting to Sherlock's mind to guide us out of the maze. There seemed no rhyme or reason to it, but I followed. "Sherlock, we just went past the courtyard -"

"I know."

"But the entrance is back that way!"

"No, it isn't. Not anymore."

"What do you mean, not anymore?!"

"Something I observed earlier. I can't explain why!"

We dashed through the lobby, the old man at the front desk barely looking up as we banged into the locked front door.

"We are checking out. Now," I demanded.

The man smiled. It was unsettling. "You can check out anytime you like, but I'm afraid that you can never leave."

The chanting grew, ringing through the hotel. "Why?" Sherlock shouted,

"Everyone gets what they want, here. Some remember. Some forget. Some get everything their Tiffany-twisted minds have ever wanted. Everyone can taste of their secret desires at the feast," his smile grew wider. "But you already knew that. Stay awhile. You'll never be bored, I can guarantee it."

"This place doesn't make sense. The halls are a clever mirror trick, making them seem more complex than they really are. The people drugged, possibly here against their will, possibly not. An intricate speaker system and gas vents provide the sounds and smells. But why? What is the cause of it all?"

"Mirror tricks? Drugs? Speaker systems? Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure! It's the only explanation!"

The old man laughed. "Not quite," he smiled, a wide, toothy grin as the room grew hot.

"We never really checked in," I said, "There's no record of us being here, so we're leaving."

The old man held up a pen. "Sign your name to the room, Sherlock, and I'll tell you exactly how I do it. And you, John. You're condemning all the souls here to their fate. If you leave now, you'll never help them."

It was tempting. I hated leaving, knowing there were people in danger that I didn't even try to help. It was Sherlock's uncertainty that decided it for me. The last time someone tempted Sherlock with the unknown, with a relief from boredom, I shot him.

I grabbed the lamp off the counter and threw it out the window.

The man screamed, a wordless howl of rage as the lobby walls burst into flames. Out of the smoke a huge Beast limped, bloody from its lifetime of wounds, still bleeding. The woman in jewelry called from the top of the stairs, begging us to stay, calling for help and laughing to invite us to have anything we wanted. We dived through the broken window and sprinted to the car.

I pulled into the empty lot of a petrol station. "It's still open. Maybe they can call the police."

"And what are you going to tell them?"

"I don't know. But we have to do something."

We went inside, Sherlock falling behind as I approached the counter. "Hi, is there a phone we could use?"

"There's an old payphone outside, still works."

"Don't you have a phone for the shop? This is really, very important. We have to call -"

"Forget it, John."

I turned to Sherlock. "What?"

He gestured to a picture hanging on the wall in a corner. I went closer. My mouth fell open.

It was a yellowed article, one of many framed and hanging in a collection of local news through the years. This one described how a fire had destroyed an old hotel down the road, back in 1969. No one had survived. The photo was of the burned out ruins afterward.

And there, standing off to the side, was the man we'd seen at the front desk. He looked exactly the same.

"Impossible," I breathed, "it had to be everything you said, all the elaborate tricks -"

"Was this hotel ever rebuilt?" Sherlock asked the shop attendant.

"Nope. Never got much business, lots of rumors around it about weird cults and such. You probably passed what's left of the ruins on the way here, not that you'd see it in the dark."

We stared at each other. Sherlock sighed, "Come on, John. We'll take turns driving as the other sleeps until we reach the airport."


End file.
